After reading the chapter on personas (CooperReimann_2003_PersonasChapter.pdf
), please answer the following two questions:
), please answer the following two questions:
1.In our HCI class, you are learning how to develop effective user interviews that inform the design process. Using what you (now) know about effective user interviews, please explain how the quality of the user interview will affect the usefulness of your persona. That is, explain how good vs. poor interview questions are likely to affect the development of personas. Please be specific and try to provide a concrete example. (I.e., don't just say: poor questions will lead to bad data that results in a bad persona. Explain HOW and WHY poor interview questions will be problematic in this context.)
2. To what extent do you see a good instructional designer as being able to create a user persona without extensive data collection and/or interviewing? Please be specific and explain your position using information about personas from the chapter.
1. Interview quality & usefulness of persona development
Our design of an Augmented Reality app proposes to engage the young user in the museum. Regardless of how youthful I believe I still am, I cannot anticipate the responses (through my imagination and empathy) of the Digital Natives (a useful metaphor I have borrowed from Marc Prensky for young learner's). I found in our early interviews last week, following our draft creation of interview questions, that it wasn't simply the subject matter of the question that was asked that was important, it was also how the question itself was asked.
I found that the young learners - between the ages of 9 - 12 at this point - perceived themselves as subject matter experts (SMEs) in the interaction. And SMEs they certainly are. I found that it was necessary to consider their opinion as a professional user - they saw themselves as equals to adults in the process. So, we addressed them that way with equal respect and dignity.
I also found myself falling easily into the questioning patterns that we agreed were "bad" questioning - yes/no questions and questions suggesting what we might be developing (forgive the enthusiasm of a creative designer making solutions for problems that don't really exist). A "yes" to a question we had already hypothesized an answer for - "Do you think more tech would be useful in the museum?" - really doesn't lead anywhere. It simply coaxes the ego of the designer/interviewer. And the kids seemed eager to answer "yes." But of course, the answer "yes" to the previous question is really vacuous & sort of a "no-brainer."
2. User persona creation without extensive data collection
A good designer should, perhaps, be familiar with the market segment for which he/she is creating an interface. The designer should have had some experience with the potential user prior to hypothesizing an interface that would address the goals of the user for which he/she is creating the design - in our case, the Digital Natives. As implied in the previous question's answer, it is important to empathize with potential primary users without simply becoming "self-referential" - we are not the kids - (Cooper, p. 58) or projecting "stereotypes" (Cooper, p. 60) - who are these kids anyway, and really, it is a bit arrogant to assume we know how they think and feel.
It's important, as Cooper (p. 56) points out, to choose the "right individuals to design for." This much must be anticipated by a designer, otherwise the seeking of interviews may be too broad. Too broad of a scope for the derivation of a persona may produce too many applications on a designer's interface. The vagueness of that kind of supposition would doubtless create an interface with many yet unusable applications, unfocused on a specific user, as in the sports car/Humvee synthesis in Figure 5-1 (Cooper, p. 56). Such creations are useful only as examples of bad designs.
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